Written transcript of the lecture
The Meshkat-e Noor teachings series🌼🔆🌼A Love Beyond Love🌼🔆🌼
🔹On the eve of the martyrdom of Imam Sajjad (peace be upon him)
📅 Date: 1404/04/17 — 17 Muharram 1447
✨ Session: Meshkat-e Noor
🎤 Speaker: Master Ali Saei
📝 Some of the themes discussed in the session:
🕌 Sajjad: Prince of Love and Intimate Prayer
Peace be upon you, O adornment of the worshippers, O pride of those who keep vigil in prayer;
Peace be upon you, O leader of the God-fearing;
Peace be upon you, O guardian of the Muslims;
Peace be upon you, O delight of the eyes of those who behold you.
On the eve of the martyrdom of the Master of the Prostrators, our lord Ali ibn al-Husayn (peace be upon him),
we offer our condolences to the celestial realm, accompanied by blessings upon Muhammad and his family.
Imam Sajjad (peace be upon him), prince of love and intimate prayer,
the supreme sovereign of love’s beauty, delight, and joy,
king of loving devotion, the very essence of beauty, the delight of the Messenger’s eyes ﷺ.
A wondrous, singular, mysterious gateway to servitude to God.
O God, let us know Your Sajjad.
Who is Sajjad? Who, truly, is Sajjad?
O God, if only we could know him,
what might we not accomplish in serving You?
To know Imam Sajjad (peace be upon him) is to pass beyond the bounds of servitude;
it is to surpass servitude itself.
Whoever knows Sajjad has outstripped love and loving devotion.
This is what Imam Sajjad’s intimate prayers do:
they attune the human palate to what lies beyond love,
letting us taste what lies on love’s farther shore.
That is Sajjad’s gift.
That is the gnosis of Sajjad.
What does Sajjad do to our soul and spirit?
He turns them inside out.
Sajjad shows us what lies beyond falling in love.
✨ Sajjad: Our guide beyond the divine attributes
Sajjad showed us that affection, love, is only one road.
He showed us that there is something beyond love, too;
something beyond love’s taste,
beyond pleasure,
beyond beauty.
Imam Sajjad (peace be upon him) taught us
that we must reach what lies beyond all attributes.
Imam Sajjad (peace be upon him) taught us
that God’s most beautiful names are His vessels,
carrying us beyond the names themselves.
How astonishing! What am I saying?
What realm am I speaking of?
Have I tasted it? I have not!
Then what am I saying?
Have any signs of his presence reached us?
They certainly have!
We are immersed in Sajjad and do not even know it.
By God, we are afloat in the spirit of Imam Sajjad (peace be upon him).
With his whole being, he has submerged us in himself.
I must understand Sajjad
if I am to taste the highest form of servitude to God.
Without Sajjad, it is impossible!
The way is near, yet veiled…
Without a single line, it is the very veil of God!
A veil with no lines or curtain.
Where do all these intimate prayers come from?
What does this veil do to us?
What secrets does it disclose and reveal?
It carries us along itself.
Imam Sajjad (peace be upon him) taught us to become
that very intimate prayer to God!
Every minstrel of the path of worship and servitude,
when wishing to call upon their Lord,
spreads our taste throughout this world of being.
What am I saying? I do not know…
Perhaps I have tasted a little of the “purifying wine” of the Sajjadi supplications.
📖 Sahifa Sajjadiyya: The manifestation of the Great Occultation within us
Yet surely, the Sahifa Sajjadiyya is Imam Sajjad himself;
it is Imam Sajjad’s voice during the Great Occultation.
They are in occultation…
This scroll that we behold
is hidden from me because I am heedless!
I am heedless…
My innate nature is dead,
lying half-alive,
oblivious.
I do not see.
I read the Ṣaḥīfa Sajjādiyya,
but I do not understand,
because the Sajjādian nature within my soul lies asleep.
I have not awakened.
That Sajjādian trust is within my soul.
Perhaps I have slain it and know nothing of it.
With the fuel of the Ṣaḥīfa Sajjādiyya, I should
soar beyond the Lote Tree of the Utmost Boundary!
I should outstrip all the lovers in the world,
and take my place among the angels and the great prophets.
I have silenced the Ṣaḥīfa Sajjādiyya of my innate nature…
and know nothing of it!
I have frozen every ray of light from the Immaculate Imams, peace be upon them.
I will not let their light shine.
I stand in the way of God’s radiant lights.
God has entrusted every light to my soul;
I am the one who keeps them from shining.
The Ṣaḥīfa Sajjādiyya lies in the Great Occultation.
The companions of the Sajjādiyya lie in the Great Occultation,
in the Greater Occultation.
No one seeks out Imam Sajjād, peace be upon him,
so that the Imam might unveil to them the secrets of Karbala.
He speaks of secrets.
Imam Sajjād carries the secret of ʿĀshūrāʾ in his soul.
He speaks. He has spoken. He has spoken again and again.
Then why have I not heard?
I should have become ʿĀshūrāʾ-like.
Have I? I have not!
Am I wounded with the wounds of al-Ḥusayn?
I am not.
The wounds of al-Ḥusayn are not in my soul.
If they were not, I would not be here.
I was absent.
⏳ ʿĀshūrāʾ, the Ṣaḥīfa, and leaping through time
Why must I be absent from ʿĀshūrāʾ?
That man who whispered in my ear:
“We must outstrip time,
and stop the Imam al-Ḥusayn, peace be upon him, from being martyred
at the hands of the deceivers…”
How had he come to feel this way?
He wanted to leap, to reach that time!
He wanted to become “water,” to flow
to the other side of history!
How?
He had tasted something of the Ṣaḥīfa.
And he had discovered…
What secrets he revealed!
He had set out…
The warm hand of the Sajjādiyya had enfolded him,
and its warmth had made him a bearer of secrets.
What we see
is only the outward…
The inner reality is something else.
🌫 The world has sunk into the Greater Occultation
Everything lies in the Greater and the Great Occultation.
Prayer, too, is in occultation… is it not?
It is.
The pilgrimage?
It is.
Almsgiving, worship, servitude?
All are in occultation.
Divine oneness is in the Greatest Occultation.
Is it not?
It is!
Ethics?
Suspended.
Righteous deeds?
Suspended.
Where is the marketplace of servitude to God?
People are drunk on ignorance.
They are immersed in their own ignorance.
Vices hold sway.
Humanity is in chains…
and takes pride in being chained!
The devils have bound people in chains,
and people boast of those very chains.
Nature is being destroyed…
is it not?
It is at death’s door.
No one knows!
Everyone welcomes this state of affairs…
Humanity has become a puppet in the devils’ show.
Has it not?
It has!
Humanity is the devils’ laughingstock…
What are we to do?!
📚 Those we thought were… the ones at fault!
One day, the moment will come;
it will all be over.
A day will come
when those very people we have spoken of
will be swept away like rubbish.
Who are they?
O God, come to our aid.
We have left everything forsaken.
We have fled from the Qur’an and the Ahl al-Bayt.
We have fled from the truth of the Qur’an and the Ahl al-Bayt.
Someone takes the Qur’an in hand,
recites it in a beautiful voice…
yet it lies forsaken!
Abandoned by our hands.
We have left the Qur’an behind.
We do not gaze into the heavens within the Qur’an.
We never lift our eyes to its heavens,
never venture to its horizons.
👁 Imam Sajjad (AS) to Jabir: Set your thinking right
What am I speaking of?
In those days, Imam Sajjad (AS)
said to Jabir:
“Set your thinking right, O Jabir, and rein in your thoughts.”
Jabir had looked around
and found a few people who seemed to be sincere,
as dust from the sea of the Ahl al-Bayt.
He points to them,
speaking of their lofty stations.
He says they have arrived,
have tasted your way,
have found the path…
The Imam says: O Jabir!
(A gentle hint to Jabir, as though he himself were one of them)
“Jabir, think less of them. They are at fault!
They have fallen short in their duty toward us.
Those you imagine to be dust at our threshold—
they are at fault!
They are not among your companions!”
He does not say, “They are not among my companions”;
he says, “They are not among your companions.”
If Jabir is among those close to the Imam,
that means there are only a handful like him.
🔐 Sajjad: Keeper of the Secrets of Ashura
He asks about those who fall short…
They have failed to know the Imams as they should.
They have fallen short in what Allah has made incumbent upon them: knowing His awliya’.
The Imam says:
“I know them… Of all those people,
only a very few come to me.
They greet me,
learn from me,
come to know our secrets,
learn from me what we keep within and conceal,
receive from me the hidden depths of our knowledge.”
Who has ever gone to Sajjad
to be taught by him?
He pierces the outward form and reveals the inward meaning.
By God, the Sahifa Sajjadiyya has an inner dimension too.
The beautiful outward form of the Sahifa
lifts the soul into flight.
By God, it has an inner dimension!
And another within it!
An earth and a heaven!
Secrets and hidden treasures!
Inner depths!
Hidden knowledge!
Imam Sajjad (AS) himself is the keeper of his own treasury.
He teaches us.
All we need is to sit with sincerity
at the threshold of the Sajjadi treasury.
And observe the proper etiquette.
🕯 The One Who Remains: A Link to Mahdi (AJ)
The Imam says:
“So-and-so, son of so-and-so, whom you speak of…
they are your brothers.”
The Imam has left something behind for them.
They have not found that legacy;
they have not received it from us.
What is this “legacy” of the Ṣaḥīfa al-Sajjādiyya?
The legacy we must receive from the Imam’s manifestation.
If we do not receive it…
It is the same thing said about the 313 companions.
That legacy**
is His Eminence, the Mahdi (AJ).
“The Greatest Remnant of God.”
If we fail to recognise that remnant…
then we are the losers!
We have not attained true knowledge of each of the Imams.
If we fail to attain it, we will be left behind.
The other secrets that must be unveiled
will not come to light.
☀️ If the sun of wilayah rises within us…
So many people think they have arrived,
when they are still unripe in wilayah.
By God, they are unripe.
Wilayah is not about making a show!
Love for the Prophet’s Family is not a matter of claims.
It must be proven.
Those who make claims are always disgraced.
That disgrace—the shortcoming behind it—must be remedied.
Where do we stand?
Where on the sun do we fix our gaze?
Do we know the stars, or not?
We gaze at the stars from afar;
we gaze at the Ṣaḥīfa al-Sajjādiyya from afar,
just as we look at the stars…
We read it, but from afar.
We read the Imam from afar.
We must read the Ṣaḥīfa al-Sajjādiyya up close.
Even I, reading it in ignorance, become intoxicated!
If I read it with knowledge,
what immense transformation would take place within me?
🌸 If the Imam’s light shines upon the soil of the heart…
What can a single light do?
What does sunlight do to flowers and plants, to seeds, to soil?
What does it do?
It makes the soil bloom, fills it with fragrance, makes it beautiful.
If that flower possessed knowledge of those sciences,
it could receive all the sun’s treasures.
What would happen?
If we receive God’s lights from the presence of the Prophet’s Family
with knowledge and understanding,
what transformation would take place within us?
What would we become?
Or, better put: what could we not become?
What heights we could reach…!
🌀 If the sun were to set… what would remain?
If, for one moment, this sun vanished from the sky,
what would happen?
The world would fall apart.
Darkness would engulf everything.
If gravity suddenly ceased, we would be left suspended.
A stone adrift in the darkness,
life-killing cold,
devastating earthquakes—we would face them… wouldn’t we?
We would!
Whether we choose it or not,
we are encompassed by God’s lights.
We are held within the gravitational pull of the Prophet’s Family.
May it never be severed!
If we attain knowledge of the Prophet’s Family,
what will happen within us?
🌌 I cannot gather the heavenly manna and quails…
We look up at the sky…
From every star,
gifts and provisions from God, from Allah,
rain down upon us.
But I cannot catch them!
I cannot make that galactic “manna and quail”
the nourishment of my soul.
What if I could…?
O God!
All these galaxies and nebulae, beyond counting—
each one has an effect on us.
We must absorb the full power of this universe and feed on it.
And these heavenly realms,
which encompass the entire universe—
God has placed a key in our hearts…
so that we might unlock them
and, all at once, possess all the light, the lights of God.
So why can’t I turn that key?
🌊 What if your water were to sink into the earth?
Tell me:
if your water were suddenly to sink into the earth,
who could bring you fresh, flowing water?
Would it vanish?
Yes—by God, it would vanish!
When we are ungrateful for a blessing, God
takes it away from us.
🌗 What if the night lasted forever?
Tell me:
if God made this night everlasting for you,
stretching it on without end, until the Day of Resurrection,
and did not allow day to dawn…
is there any god besides Allah
who could bring you light again?
Where is our light?
It shines—even through the clouds.
What if it stretched on until the Day of Resurrection?
If He made the day everlasting, lasting until the Resurrection,
is there any god besides Allah who could bring you a night, a layl,
in which you might find rest and peace?
Will you not reflect?
🪐 We are still imprisoned on Earth…
How far have we strayed from the Quran?
We must take to the skies.
Yet we are still imprisoned within the earth.
We have not yet ventured beyond it,
for we are poisoned by ignorance.
We have not mounted the steed of knowledge.
Had we mounted it,
we would have conquered the galaxies.
That Saqifah would not let us!
It stood in the way and dammed the flow of knowledge.
Woe to the Saqifahs in my heart…
Woe that I, at every moment, stand in the way of God’s lights spreading.
📖 I have yet to master the Quran and the Ahl al-Bayt
I cannot pledge allegiance to the Quran and the Ahl al-Bayt.
I don’t know why…
I am allied with devils!
I, who am drowning in sin,
am allied with devils.
So when will I split open this sky?
At what speed?
I am moving too slowly.
When will I conquer this Quran?
If I do not conquer it,
I have not learned the charter of servitude to God.
If I do not commit the Ahl al-Bayt to memory, I am illiterate!
So when will I finish learning the Quran and the Ahl al-Bayt?
🔑 In an instant, to the far side of existence… the key is in our hearts
So where does the secret lie?
In a single instant, I must take in everything from this end of existence to the other.
How can I live under the guidance of my Imam
and, in a single instant, sense the whole of existence?
Just as I feel my own being,
this universe, too, must become my body.
If it does not, I have lost.
I am blind, deaf and dumb—
lest I fail to reach the point of proof;
if I fail, I am dead.
🎨 God’s artistry and the mysteries of the Ahl al-Bayt await us…
I must uncover the mysteries of “God’s artistry,”
its veils and wonders…
I must grasp, all at once, the fullness of pleasure,
so I can go beyond pleasure
to what is known as “the appointed meeting with God.”
The Ahl al-Bayt are waiting for us.
That servant, unveiled, is himself the veil—
that is, a means by which we reach the other side.
When will I leap across?
🕳 The irrational deep-divers: falling beyond the bounds of divine oneness
When must I leap? I cannot leap…
Where does the mystery lie?
Where have I gone wrong?
Have I, a being of the end times, gone astray?
Imam Sajjad, peace be upon him, was asked about divine oneness.
He said:
“God knew that in the end times
there would be people bent on probing too deeply…
people who delve without reason,
seeking to uncover the purest of knowledge,
but without reason!
They do not think…
They engage in very deep thought,
but their depth is the depth of ignorance!
They think through ignorance.”
Where do they end up? Why do they not think with reason?
Because reason knows its own limits.
When its traveller goes beyond them, reason casts him off.
When it fails to know its bounds,
it turns away from itself and departs.
Those deep-divers probe the inner workings of esoteric disciplines:
the would-be mystics, the would-be philosophers, the deep-divers…
God sent down the surah of divine oneness to guide them:
“Say: He is God, the One, the First and the Last, the Manifest and the Hidden…”
🧭 Where have I fallen? On the border of polytheism!
So this is where I have fallen…
and I do not even know it.
I have thrown myself beyond the bounds of divine oneness.
I have left the table of the Qur’an for other tables!
I have destroyed myself.
I have been crossing the borders of polytheism in place of those of divine oneness.
One part of knowing ourselves
is learning to recognise our limits.
We must take our descriptions of God from God Himself.
God has made Himself known.
This is God’s own identity document.
It is the sustenance of our knowledge.
To attain knowledge of God,
we must begin our work with this very water, bread and light.
We need nothing else.
If we nourish ourselves sincerely on the light of divine oneness,
its blossoms will spring forth from within us.
🌌 The steps, sips and drops most beloved to God
O God, how can I bring this to a close?
Which saying of Imam Sajjad should I share
to set our hearts soaring?
Imam Zayn al-Abidin (peace be upon him) said to Abu Hamza al-Thumali:
“No step is more beloved to God
than these two steps he describes.”
- The step taken to join the ranks of the path of God,
to stand among God’s army.
→ This is the most beloved step to Allah. - The step a person takes toward someone who has cut ties with them,
to maintain family ties.
→ This, too, is the most beloved step to God.
🥣 The most beloved sips to God
No sip is more beloved
than these two:
- A sip of anger that a believer swallows with patience.
→ The most beloved sip to God. - A sip of affliction that a believer swallows with patience.
→ The most beloved sip to God.
💧 The most beloved drops to God
And these two drops are the most beloved drops to Allah:
- A drop of blood shed in the way of God.
→ The most beloved drop to God. - A tear shed in the darkness of night,
with no request in it,
other than to send an expression of servitude to the exalted presence of Allah.
🌹 Imam Sajjad: beauty in the words of flowers and stars
He is our Imam Sajjad…
Our star is our Imam Sajjad.
If we were to ask the flowers about Imam Sajjad,
what beauty they would tell us of!
If we were to ask the sun and the stars,
what they would have to say!
If we were to ask Imam Mahdi (AJ)…
🕋 The moment the Black Stone greeted Sajjad
⏱ Date: 08.07.25 – Time: 22:46
He speaks of his grandfather
in a way that leaves the whole world spellbound.
Farazdaq, too, knew Sajjad,
though differently—not in every respect, but deeply.
A knowledge that has endured in history.
That Hajj-killer, who had come to perform the pilgrimage…
During the circumambulation, when he tried to touch the Black Stone,
he was beseeching God.
At the moment of touching it, some are so overcome
that they seem on the verge of death.
That wretch tried to touch the Stone…
but the crush of people held him back.
They brought a pulpit for him to sit on,
so the people could pass and he could touch the Stone!
At that moment, they saw Imam Ali ibn al-Husayn (peace be upon him) approaching.
He wore a cloak and had the most beautiful of faces;
he was the most fragrant person on earth.
The narrator relates
how he caught the scent of Imam Sajjad.
He says:
“I saw that he had the most beautiful face.
He wore a cloak
and a waistcloth.
The sweetest fragrance came from him.
Between his eyes was the mark of prostration.
He had a distinct callus there.”
He performed the circumambulation…
When he reached the place of the Stone,
the crowd made way for him, so the Imam could come forward and touch it.
It was not that the Imam reached out to touch the Black Stone;
the Black Stone reached out to touch Sajjad!
Overawed by his majesty and reverence, they stepped aside.
And the Imam gently caressed the Stone.
🌠 Farazdaq rose to sing the praises of Sajjad, the sun
Hisham was enraged.
A man from Syria who did not know the Imam
turned to Hisham and asked:
“Who is this man, that everyone, awed by his presence,
has cleared the way for him to reach the Stone?”
Out of jealousy, Hisham replied:
“I don’t know.”
But Farazdaq’s sense of honor stirred!
“Syrian, if he doesn’t know…
I do!
The man, eager and intent, said:
‘Tell me who he is!’”
And Farazdaq began to describe him…
“Hisham! You don’t know this pride of heaven and earth?
I know him. You don’t.
The idol-worshipper does not know the footsteps of the Imam—
that is, he does not know himself;
he cannot know Sajjad…
Yet he knows the place where his feet have trod.
The House of God knows him!”
🌟 All virtues find their perfection in him…
“This master is the son of the finest of God’s servants in all creation.
He is the Pure One; he is the Chosen One.
He is purity; he is knowledge.
He is Ali… The Messenger of God is his father.”
The darkness of the world is lit by his light.
When Quraysh speak of him,
they say:
“Honor and virtue reach their culmination in him.
All the world’s noblest qualities are gathered in this Imam.”
🌹 Hear him speak for himself: “I am the son of Mecca and Safa”
And now, a word from Imam Sajjad himself, describing who he is:
“Farazdaq, come…
let me too describe myself in my own words…”“Those who know me, know me.
And those who do not know me,
I will not tell them of my lineage and ancestry.O people!
I am the son of Mecca and Mina.
I am the son of Zamzam and Safa.
I am the one
who carried the Corner in the folds of my cloak…”
